US critical of Iran election process

AFP: The White House on Thursday criticized Tehran’s practice of vetting candidates, saying that Iranian voters should be able to “choose the candidates they want” in March 14 parliamentary elections.
WASHINGTON (AFP) — The White House on Thursday criticized Tehran’s practice of vetting candidates, saying that Iranian voters should be able to “choose the candidates they want” in March 14 parliamentary elections.

“We would hope that any elections they have are free and fair and allow the people of Iran to choose the candidates they want,” US National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe told AFP.

His comments came after Iran’s interior ministry announced that the country’s conservative vetting bodies had banned nearly one in three potential candidates in the elections, without specifying their political affiliations.

But a spokesman for the Reformists’ Coalition that is inspired by former President Mohammad Khatami, said Wednesday that more than 50 percent of the group’s candidates had been rejected.

Another reformist party — National Confidence — said 70 percent of its candidates rejected.

In 2004, Iranian authorities banned more than 2,000 out of 8,172 registered, many of them reformists, leading that way for the victory of the conservatives.